Islamic State militants have shut the gates to the Euphrates River dam in western Iraq, limiting the amount of water coming through, media reports have said. The tactic gives the group battlefield advantage, and has also sparked humanitarian concerns.

“Previously [security forces] had to monitor only the bridges and
certain areas, but now all of the river will be crossable,”
Reuters reported Hikmat Suleiman, spokesman for Anbar Governor
Suhaib al-Rawi, as saying.

The capital of Anbar province, Ramadi, is a particular concern
for the Iraqi forces since the Euphrates River was a natural
barrier between IS militants on the northern bank and security
forces on the southern bank.

Suleiman added that troops now need to be spread out across the
river to keep the militants out.

The closing of the gates also put the southern provinces at risk
of draught.

One of the solutions proposed by the Anbar provincial council to
deal with this problem involved blowing up one of the dam’s gates
to release the closed-off water.

The United Nations
condemned Islamic State’s use of freshwater as a weapon. “The
use of water as a tool of war is to be condemned in no uncertain
terms,” Stephane Dujarric, spokesman for UN
secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, told reporters Wednesday.
“These kinds of reports are disturbing, to say the
least.”

Islamic State used similar tactics in the past against the Iraqi
forces. About a year ago, the extremist group managed to take
control over the Mosul dam in northern Iraq, threatening to flood
Baghdad. Eventually, ISIS was driven out by the Kurdish forces.